I was going to leave the Hugh Freeze ouster at Ole Miss to the sportswriters but I noticed the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette print account this morning of his abrupt departure (from the AP) made no mention of Arkansas’s own Houston Nutt, except as the coach Freeze succeeded.
By most accounts, Houston Nutt’s unhappiness about being blamed for Freeze’s recruiting scandal led to the unearthing of phone records that did Freeze in. Nutt’s own problems at the University of Arkansas — derived from his itchy cell phone finger and the state public records law — is also a point of coincidental interest.
Yahoo columnist Dan Wetzel has put the whole thing together. His take is friendly to Nutt — a man depicted as just wanting an apology for accusations of misdeeds. It is unfriendly to Freeze because, really, is there any more tempting target than a Bible-spouting, lying hypocrite?
Wetzel details how Nutt’s attorney, Tom Mars, used the open records law to get Freeze’s phone records in the effort to prove Ole Miss people had bad-mouthed Nutt. Those records showed a call to what’s believed to be an escort service. Freeze blew it off as a misdial. It was a lame excuse. Ole Miss officials kept digging. They say they found a pattern.
SB Nation also has an account detailing the “poetic” nature of Nutt’s upending of Freeze, given the flap over his own numerous phone calls to a comely news anchor back in the UA days.
Nuttin’ but hot fun in the summer time.
ALSO: This Twitter string getting a lot of attention. Takes the story back to Mitch Mustain.